Monday, December 13, 2010

I have a novel idea for how to fight childhood obesity; how about parents start paying attention to what their kids are eating instead of expecting others to do it for them? Making people take responsibility for their own choices... I know it seems like a radical idea but maybe we should give it a goddamn try!

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

I got into an argument recently.

The argument was about whether an individual's judgment is better than a community's judgment. This friend of mine who I argued with is a self-described liberal. Who claims that the judgment of the community is more important than the rights of the individual.

It occurred to me afterward, I wish it had occurred to me then, that their stance is somewhat inconsistent when you consider their opinion on certain issues. Proposition 8, for example. They consider it a good thing Prop 8 was struck down. But they had also said, during the conversation, that it was okay for the community to decide on rules and laws that individuals didn't agree with and that as long as it was the will of the majority, it should be followed. Yet Proposition 8 was proposed and voted on in California. Where a majority of those who turned out to vote on the proposition decided they wanted it as law. So that was the will of the majority. That was the will of the community. The decision to try and overturn it is the will of individuals. The decision to try and claim it is unconstitutional is the judgment of an individual.

I generally trust an individual to have better judgment than a community, I'll be honest. At least when it comes to THEIR OWN LIFE. Not necessarily when it comes to what constitutes public policy and the public good. The truth is that if you fully embrace individual choice with no communal structure, what you have is anarchy. And if you fully embrace community with no individual choice, what you have is a machine dictating the lives of the people whose individual lives, devoid of choice, lack meaning.

There has to be a communal structure for people to co-exist on a larger scale. What that structure should be depends on the individuals involved in it. There have to be some rules people can agree on. Some areas that the communal structure - the system - that we can call government are responsible for. But what areas should the community be responsible for and what areas should an individual be responsible for?

If a farmer works hard, by himself, and has a surplus of his crop - more than he needs - he might decide to sell or trade some of his surplus to those who need it in exchange for something he needs or wants. In that way, he benefits from his efforts, his time, energy and resources he expended on growing those crops. If the community decides it's important to feed those who can't feed themselves, I believe the community should PURCHASE the excess from the farmer. Not take it. The community should not force charity. And there are a lot of reasons for this.

Moral reasons: Forcing someone to labor for others without being able to benefit from their efforts and without a choice in the matter is basically slavery. People have the right to benefit from their labor. They have the right to make certain choices when it comes to what to do with their life.

Practical reasons: Motivation. If the farmer knows he's not going to be allowed to keep the surplus, why would the farmer ever grow a surplus? Maybe some people would. But a lot of people won't spend their time, effort and other resources on something so labor-intensive if they can't in some way benefit from it. And if the farmer decides he's not going to make a surplus anymore, the community can't take a surplus that doesn't exist. So the only thing the community can do is suffer because now, instead of people being able to trade their goods and labor that the farmer may need to get the surplus, the community as a whole has less food. Unless the community decides it's okay to take what the farmer grew for himself. And leave the farmer without enough food to feed himself and his family. And when that sort of thing happens, it never ends well. History has shown that it never ends well. Best case scenario? The farmer decides "screw you guys, I'm going to take my stuff and leave" and the community loses all benefit from having the farmer at all. Worst case scenarios tend toward violence.

The US decided, ages ago, that US citizens should be subject to various forms of taxation. No matter where they are in the world. There are US citizens who have been living and working in foreign countries for years who are giving up their citizenship because they are being taxed to support a country they haven't seen in years, don't know if they will ever see again and which is spending its resources on things that in no way shape or form that they can see benefit them more than becoming a resident of the countries in which they live and labor. People do decide "I'm taking my stuff and going away. Screw you guys." You can't stop them from deciding that. Unless you want to try to force them into full on slavery. And there's no way to pretend it would be anything other than that.

That's not a strawman. That's not an exaggeration. Yes, it addresses the extremes of the spectrum. But we move further and further toward the extreme ends of the spectrum as long as we let one side keep pulling us in one direction. Unless you really truly believe, somehow, that the much-vaunted idea of the "community" is so perfect, that the people who make up the community are so perfect that such a thing could never happen. And if you believe that, go read your history books. It already has happened. It has happened before and it could happen again. Communities are not noble. Communities are built on self-interest. The choice, then, is which you would rather have. Individuals pursuing their self-interest? Or the community forcing individuals to bend to its self-interest even if it means giving up their rights?

Tuesday, August 3, 2010

So, I've been in Europe and the United Kingdom for the past several weeks.

I'll keep this short. Before I left, I got into an argument with someone about the police. Now, I used to work for the police department. I tend to be pretty pro-cops. I do know that you have some bad cops. And that even good cops are just ordinary people doing the best they can under the circumstances and sometimes they lose control or they have a lapse in judgment. People screw up.

The other side basically attempted to say that cops are all bad and used all the stories that have been in the news about all the times cops have been found to have used excessive force or overstepped their bounds. I have a hard time figuring out what he was actually trying to say, mind you. Because he claimed he wasn't advocating the lack of a police force. That he even acknowledged the necessity of a police force. But kept going on about how cops are bad and cops shouldn't do these things.

Yes... and? Cops should not lose their temper. Ideally, they should always be aware of their surroundings and use proper judgment. And ideally there should be no bad cops. But we don't live in an ideal world and cops are still people. And you have some people who are going to abuse their authority no matter what. And you have people who are going to screw up from time to time. And when you're a cop, your screw-ups may have bigger consequences than those of the average person. But there's not exactly a "solution" to that problem. You train the cops the best you can and have oversight, investigations and disciplinary action when they step out of bounds. We have that. Of course, that doesn't work exactly the way some people would like it to since it sometimes clears cops of wrongdoing when some people believe they shouldn't be cleared. I'm not saying there aren't cases where a cop has been cleared when they shouldn't have been. But I AM saying this; if a cop is in a dark alley, responding to a call for assistance or pursuing a perp and sees someone holding something that looks like a weapon and that cop calls for the person to put it down and that person raises it pointing in the direction of the officer? The officer should fire. If the officer was close enough to discern whether or not it was a weapon and found it wasn't, that's different. But when the officer doesn't know? That officer's life is on the line. And not firing his weapon could mean his death. And an officer should be cleared in a situation like that.

An officer should be cleared in an investigation where he used his taser to gain compliance from a subject who is flailing about and resisting arrest in a manner that is likely to end up causing serious injury to the subject, the officer or bystanders. An officer should be cleared for using pepper spray on a violent drunk.

Now there are a million things an officer shouldn't be cleared for, too. But all these people insisting how bad cops are happen to be forgetting; the officer's job isn't just to arrest someone. It's to keep the peace and ensure the safety of themselves and the general public.

If you don't like the cops, do everyone a favor; before you start badmouthing them, at least have a coherent point to make. Don't just point at things they've done wrong over the years without an endpoint to your argument. If you think there should be no cops and it should be lawlessness, I vote we petition the US government to send you to some third world country where things are basically that way so you can live the kind of life you claim to want. If you just think we need to be more effective at oversight, investigation and discipline? Ok. I can grant that. But keep in mind we're also severely shorthanded in law enforcement in the US. We're trying not to let go of officers where we don't have to in a lot of places (though from what I've read lately, that may be changing). So how do you balance those priorities? The need to have officers out there is real and significant.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

So, I made the mistake of watching an "amateur comedy night." I'm sure they'd take offense with my referring to it as "amateur night." But they were definitely amateurs. Not just at comedy - at thinking. Apparently, most would-be comedians seem to be under the mistaken impression that volume = quality. They yell and scream into the microphone until it hurts your ears. They get upset if you don't clap - or don't clap loud enough. Their jokes are generally tasteless and not funny, ex. "So, they released the report about what killed Gary Coleman. It was a different kind of stroke. Well, at least Michael Jackson now has someone to play with. And it's not technically pedophilia."

I'm not making that up.

I don't think it's wrong to make jokes about celebrities. I don't think it's necessarily wrong to make jokes about dead people or about death. But every single joke told by these people was told in a manner that made it apparent that they believe themselves smarter, wiser, somehow more worthy than the rest of the world. And don't even get me started on their so-called social commentary. Or their political bits. Now, I understand so-called "entertainers" have a tendency to be fairly liberal. I get that. And I get that it's because they've generally either a) been raised privileged enough not to have to worry about a real career, b) been raised to believe that education somehow makes up for intelligence, c) been indoctrinated by the culture of their industry. I get that. I get that most of them won't have a 9-5 job for the majority of their life. I get that most of them probably don't want a 9-5 job, preferring a job that allows them to have their nights free to pat each other on the back and drink too much. I understand how attractive a drug and alcohol induced haze can be compared to the realities of life.

I understand how people feel like something is wrong as long as some people starve to death. Or freeze on the streets. Or die of heatstroke. Or just don't have a home to go to, don't have the money for clothes. All while a minority of our population live in luxury. I understand how that can look like some form of injustice must be being perpetrated. And I'm not saying there isn't any injustice. I'm not "pro-wealth." I'm pro-reality. I'm for realizing that there's more to it than just seeing that everyone has a good meal and place to sleep. And it is beyond ridiculous to try and blame the wealthy "because they're wealthy" for the state of affairs. What would be a perfect solution to hunger? Hmm? Making sure everyone gets enough to eat isn't "the solution", it's the goal. The solution is how you're going to make sure everyone gets enough to eat. First, determine "how much is enough?" Because the more you have to give everyone at each meal, the more you have to somehow produce. Then ask yourself "how will we produce this amount of food?" Let's assume it's all crops. Someone has to grow the crops. Someone has to plant them, see to irrigation, keep pests away, harvest and process and transport the crops. Who's going to do all of that? And who's going to pay for all of that?

The government isn't an endless supply of money. "Government cheese" is a ridiculous idea, the government is already hemorrhaging money. Is everyone going to chip in and donate money to this endeavour? Or are we going to somehow do all of this without any money? That's not going to happen, not in this world.

What should the government provide for people? What should people provide for themselves? Does equality mean everyone has the same things and the same amount of everything? Or does equality mean providing a system in which a person's hard work, dedication and drive to succeed can give him the opportunity to acquire for himself what it is he desires? Some people denounce greed as evil. Greed is not evil. Greed is a human motivator. The desire to have something you do not have or to have more than you have. Greed is not evil. Greed motivates people to succeed. It motivates people to study, to work hard. It motivates people toward accomplishment. Greed can be taken to extremes. There are those who are greedy to have everything but who do not want to work or expend resources to acquire the things they desire. Those who want others to provide for them. These people are lazy. They are greedy AND they are lazy. That is when things start going bad. They want what others have. They want more than what others have, in fact, because they don't want to have to earn what others have. When people have no incentive to put forward any effort, they don't. The struggle for achievement, for improvement, for advancement of the self-interest is motivated by the promise of some kind of reward. Perhaps the reward is peace of mind. Perhaps the reward is access to greater resources. Perhaps the reward is self-fulfillment. When someone else provides everything for you, you have no incentive to advance your own interest.

In short, I understand the sentiment behind being upset and thinking it is "unfair" that some people have more than others. But that is life. That is the way the world works. Things aren't always fair. And I don't begrudge people their grumbling. Everybody grumbles. Especially on the bottom of the ladder. The person who goes out and works sixty hours a week swinging a hammer and hauling cinderblocks and shingles around and gets paid less than the scrawny twerp who sits in an office counting pencils all day is going to bitch. That's normal. I've been that kind of guy.

But the kid whose only job has been waiting tables, not because they were too poor or stupid to go to college and pursue a better career but because they were too LAZY.... the kid whose parents are still paying their bills ofr them... the kid who has never had to worry about such basic things as budgeting and making sure they had enough to pay the light bill and buy groceries for the month... that kid has no damn right to bitch about unfairness. And more to the point, that kid has no damn right to sit there and tell me - when I'm working 60+ hours a week - that I have to give up a pile of the money I'm earning to try and provide for myself and my family so that someone can make things "more fair."

Friday, May 28, 2010

Millionaire taxesApparently some liberal lawmakers are advocating millionaire taxes as a way to help offset the massive deficits throughout the US. I can’t believe I have to explain why this is a bad idea. But here we are.First, let’s break down where income comes from. There are two primary sources of income for most people - employment income and investment income. Employment income is your salary or wages, the amount you earn from working. Investment income is what you earn on your investments over the course of the year.Right now, the federal income tax rate (for a single person) is 33% if you make between (approximately) $171,000 and $370,000 a year. After that, it goes to 35%. Then you pay state income taxes. Which, depending on where you live, could be anywhere from nothing (or practically nothing) to another 11%. Let’s pick a well known location for a point of reference. NY. Their high end of the state income tax is about 9%, last I checked. So someone making, let’s say, $400,000 in employment income will pay approximately 44% of that in income taxes. Now, I personally could live on the remaining 56% of that quite comfortably, even in NY. The new millionaire’s taxes they’re proposing could add another 10% or more to the taxes. So the person making $400,000 would actually be bringing home less than half of what he is technically getting paid. I hear some of you saying “that’s still a lot of money.” And maybe it is. But what is the person doing to earn that money? If they’re working 12 hours a day, six days a week… well, if I were that person, I’d be rather upset that I don’t even get to keep half of what I earn. But people whose primary income is employment income aren’t the real problem with the millionaire’s tax, even though they’ll suffer the most from it.Before I get into discussing investment income, I have to point out to the more idealistic people out there that a plan is only worth investing in if it has some hope of success. A plan that gives short-term benefits and causes long-term harm isn’t a good plan, no matter what the idiots in office would like you to think.The truly wealthy people in the country have often amassed assets such to the point that they don’t have to work. They don’t rely on employment income. Once you earn your first few million or so, a savvy investor can live on a portion the interest for the rest of his life and watch his investments grow his fortune. Let’s take NY again as our example. There’s a federal capital gains tax on “short term capital gains” and on “long term capital gains.” Short term is anything that’s an investment of a year or less. Long-term is something that goes on for more than a year.Short term capital gains are taxed at the same rate as the income tax. So, for the wealthy persons we’re discussing who are likely earning hundreds of thousands if not millions a year off of their investments, the tax rate on short term capital gains is already likely around 35%. Long term capital gains are taxed at 15%. Let’s add in the state tax rate on capital gains now. In NY, it’s almost 7%. So they’re getting taxed at 42% and 22% respectively. Let’s add in the millionaire’s tax at a modest 10% rate now. They’re losing over half of their short term investments and about a third of their long term investments.You might argue they can afford to lose it, that they can afford to get by with a little less. That’s not the point. Hell, my point isn’t even that it’s immoral to jack their taxes up for no other reason than because they earn more money than the rest of the populace (though it does seem kind of messed up to me, trying to force them to pay to fix idiot legislator’s screw-ups). No, my point is this; those investments of theirs? They can invest elsewhere. Instead of putting their money into the NY economy (if NY were to pass a state millionaire’s tax) they can put it into the SC economy and that would seriously harm the NY economy. If the US passes a federal millionaire’s tax? The US has a provision that says that all US citizens are subject to income and capital gains taxes no matter where in the world their investments and employment are. This means that a contractor who hasn’t seen the US in 10 years who happens to be a US citizen has to pay the taxes of the country where he’s residing and working and still pay US income and capital gains taxes. There have been a lot of people working abroad over the past decade or so who, because of this, have decided to expatriate. They’ve decided to forsake their US citizenship and take citizenship where they are to avoid paying taxes to a government halfway across the world (taxation without representation, anyone?). What makes you think millionaires couldn’t do the same? What incentive would they have to remain US residents? Even if some of them decided not to expatriate, they still don’t have to keep their investments in the US. All that money which, through investing in US businesses and investing with US banks and firms, stimulates the US economy could just as easily go into another country’s economy. What country wouldn’t benefit from a few billion dollars of venture capital being injected into their economy? Even if they still paid taxes, their investment dollars would be gone. And they wouldn’t be paying the state taxes, only the federal ones.Liberal legislators are a romantic, idealistic lot of idiots with their feet in the clouds and their heads in the sand. And no, I didn’t mess that up, I meant it that way. It’s true that raising taxes could generate some more capital for the federal government. But it sure as hell wouldn’t stimulate the economy. It wouldn’t create more jobs. It would encourage individuals and businesses to try and cut costs and spend less money, which means fewer jobs, not more. Between the house and senate, there are approximate 535 people in the two houses of congress. This isn’t counting the various staffers, special seats or executive branch seats. Their base salary is approximately $175,000 a year. That rate also applies to various federal judges and other government personnel. I’m sure if you looked into the financing, you’d also find they don’t actually pay for much. There are all sorts of perks to that kind of job. I think they could get by with $50,000 less a year in salary. You’d save over twenty six million dollars a year off of just those 535 seats. That’s not a big drop in the bucket, I know. But I, for one, would at least like to see our leaders – in a time of financial crisis – be willing to sacrifice a little bit out of their own pockets to contribute to fixing the problem instead of expecting the citizenry of the US to foot the bill for their screw-ups. Leadership by example, you know?We can’t spend our way out of this deficit by throwing money at programs that only perpetuate the problems. We need to put people to work. We need to create more than just temporary employment. We spent our way out of the great depression, yes. But we did it by creating jobs. People going off to war, production of weapons, troop transports and supplies – the war created a demand for soldiers and for supplies to equip them with. The government wasn’t just “giving” people money. The government was actively putting people to work. Soldiers got paid by the government. And to supply the soldiers, the government ramped up their purchasing of various supplies that were necessary to wage a war. Manufacturing and construction were ratcheted up. And since so many people were off at war and the demand for supplies was so high, employment was plentiful for a great many people.We hit a big hitch when the war was over and our soldiers came back and left the military and found that there weren’t any jobs, though. Thankfully, the money that had been earned during that time period allowed a lot of people to start their own businesses, allowed existing companies to grow and expand and create more jobs… it created a situation of ongoing positive growth – with some hiccups. But the growth wasn’t sustained through government spending. The growth was sustained through private spending and people working. Jobs are the only proper measure of a healthy economy. And our government needs to stop throwing good money after bad and sinking further and further into debt and expecting unemployed Americans to somehow pay for it all.

Friday, May 21, 2010

See, I'm a law student. The past several weeks were finals for us. I was a hermit living in the library. Then I was gone for the whole weekend to go visit family. Then I started my summer job this week and have been busy recovering from finals and family visits and a heavy workload.

But all that is over now.

A little about me.

I'm 26. I'm a white male. I grew up in a small town in the southeastern united states. I grew up in a family that believes in God but is mostly quiet about their belief. Not an evangelical family, but a family which taught me the value of faith and the good it can do in a person's life. They also taught me to be critical of those who would tell you how to live your life. That how we choose to live our lives (the key word is choose) is up to each and every one of us. And that no one can make the decisions for us. I firmly believe that. It was a lesson I kept in mind throughout my life. I saw the good that religion can bring into the lives of others. But I also saw the harm it can do. I now have my own personal faith. My own personal understanding of God and of faith. I believe in God. I struggle to understand more about God and God's plan all the time. But I don't go to church. Because I got tired of being told how to live my life - more specifically, I got tired of being held to a higher standard than the people who were lecturing me held themselves to. I do not respect those who wish others to "do as I say, not as I do." Leading by example, I respect.

I'm not really a conservative. I'm not a liberal, either. I don't affiliate myself with either of the two big parties. I self-identify as libertarian although I disagree with the libertarian party on god knows how many things.

I believe in the ideal of freedom. Life, liberty and happiness. Freedom of choice is a big issue with me. But freedom means nothing without responsibility. Freedom of choice means, it necessarily means, freedom to take the consequences of our choices. The thing that bothers me most about today's society is that no one wants to accept the consequences of their choices. No one wants to make a hard choice and have it not work out. And when it doesn't, they don't want to own up to their choices. Everyone, even our best leaders, makes bad decisions. We learn from them. We hope we will make the best choice when it's important. But we don't always. And when it happens that we didn't make the best choice, the most damaging thing we can do is try and sweep it under the rug. When you ignore a problem, it gets worse. Short-term solutions are a big problem. That's what our leaders and, honestly, most people seek in their lives. A way to get themselves into the best position in the short term, the long-term consequences be damned. At best, that's a temporary solution. At worst, it's cosmetic and lets the problem get worse and worse until it can't be fixed anymore.

Sunday, April 11, 2010

So, part of the jobs agenda of the democrats this year is what they call a "stopgap measure." A stopgap is a temporary substitute for something else. The particular item that is being referred to as a "stopgap measure" this year is a jobless support bill. Extending the benefits offered to people who are not working. Increasing the amount of time which unemployment will continue to pay them for and how long they will receive other benefits without having to go back to work.

Supposedly, this is part of the "jobs" agenda. Now, call me a weirdo if you want but shouldn't a "jobs" agenda be focused on figuring out ways to help create jobs or at the very least to save them? How does extending benefits to people on unemployment help to get those people back to work? How does it help the people who are worried about being laid off or fired in a struggling economy?

This doesn't seem like the kind of thing that should be in a "jobs agenda" and it definitely doesn't seem like something we should be spending over 10 billion dollars on.

I support programs like Job Corps, programs that help people to get marketable skills and place people in jobs. I support nonprofit organizations wanting to operate soup kitchens and shelters. I support the kind of efforts which are designed to help people get by until they can get back on their feet and which are designed to actually help get them back on their feet again. I cannot, however, support a measure when I see no way in which it will do any of those things. All this "stopgap" will do is to spend taxpayer money to pay people for not working. Where is the incentive for people to go back to work? Where is the job training, the job placement?

Whatever else winds up on the job agenda, this part of it needs to be cut. If it's not, it'll do nothing but plunge us that much further into debt. Thank god the jobs agenda has stalled in congress. Let's hope it stays there.

And if you doubt they're actually considering this, just follow the link.

Monday, April 5, 2010

So, an acquaintance of mine posted a remark on his page about the tea party, which prompted a number of responses. I got in on the debate to point out to these so-called “idealists” how the world works. One of them decided to try and debate me but, as you’ll see, their responses mostly ignored the issues actually raised. The most vehement respondent, besides being barely coherent at times, couldn’t even dispute the mechanics of how things work coherently. Being told “you’re wrong because your numbers are wrong” is an attempt to make the debate about the numbers. The problem is, when you attempt to do that, you’d better be able to show the numbers you’re talking about. I didn’t try and introduce what the numbers are because my point was not about that – my argument was about the natural endpoint of the recent healthcare bill.

Anyway, feel free to read for yourselves.

Original Poster drinks tea. Enjoys tea. Has many kinds of good tea at home. Sometimes even makes a pot when other people are over. This does not make him a tea partier, and he wishes the insane branch of the libertarians would stop besmirching the drink's good name. Repeat: ROSCOE DRINKS TEA. IS NOT A TEA-PARTIER.

BMInsane libertarians? Far from it, I think us tea drinking, tea partying libertarians are some of the only sane ones left. ^_^

Original PosterDo you accept, at the very least, the de-facto existence of a president of the United States named Barack Obama?

I ask only because most of the tea partiers I have read about seem to be advocating a combination of coup d'etat followed by complete elimination of the federal government. I have struggled on more than one occasion to explain to those I've met on the Internet the concept of "common good," which they summarily rejected when I suggested that a power with exclusive legitimate use of force (e.g. a government) may be better at providing national security and public order than private interests. One of them then explained that all the private interests would have a contracted court that would have the power to regulate their contracts, and seemed very annoyed when I explained that was a kind of government.

Others seemed to believe public health was not a common good, and became agitated when I asked if they'd ever had a flu shot or any sort of immunization. Yet others became incredibly angry when I demanded proof that they had never had immunization, as most children in this country are immunized against a variety of diseases at a year old. Demanding to see the health certificate, they insisted on their right to privacy. And became angry when I pointed out this was basically what the birth-certificate movement, which seems to be very closely related to the tea party movement, was doing to Obama. Except with the added fun of rejecting the certification when they saw it.

Now, does this excuse the continued privacy and civil rights violations, committed by our government, such as wiretapping, imprisonment without trial, and torture? Hell no, it don't. Does this excuse what *almost* amounts to criminal negligence in handling public funds demonstrated most profoundly by the California state government in the past year? No it does not. Does this absolve the governor or the President from criticism in terms of partisan politics and organized grievances such as questioning the budgetary decisions of his party or the direction he's chosen to pursue the common good? Often misguided (Congress controls the budget) but not at all.... See More

Does it therefore follow that we should, as one person recommended, suspend the funding of public universities and community colleges? Or any other government program you, personally, don't approve of? Or of all government programs, including the Department of Defense and INS, which I presume many of the tea partiers to be generally in favor of? Not...so much.

Original PosterI also find a lot of related bunk ideas floating around nearby (again, this is based on internet conversations and the news) such as goldbugging and mercantilism.

But the reason I posted *this* status update is that I went to get a cup of hot water, and when I pulled a tea bag out of my pocket some asshole got all up in my face about politics I ... See Moredon't support and opinions I don't have. Being, as I was, between wakefulness and tea, I couldn't give him the proper rhetorical wringing he deserved. And so when I returned here I vented on FB.

Me:I don't support forcing insurance companies to accept any and all comers and pay for all things. Insurance is based on the concept of paying in along the way to get the benefit when you need it. The companies, if required to pay out in excess of what is paid in, will go out of business. They refuse people with pre-existing medical conditions in most cases - except that some will accept them with significantly increased rates - because those people aren't taking it on a "if they need it in the future" basis. They're going to pay in less than the benefit they get and the insurance company will make no money on their policies. Follow that to its logical conclusion, when you force the companies to pay out continually more than they take in, and you find the companies going bankrupt. Those people lose their coverage unless the government takes over the entire thing, either paying out and covering all medical expenses (and going bankrupt as they pay the demanded rates) or taking over the providing of healthcare itself.

Completely aside from the inefficiency of government compared to private industry, that leads to a motivation problem. Like it or not, there are certain basic truths we have to accept. Healthcare is subject to the laws of supply and demand. There are only so many healthcare professionals to provide care to those seeking it. There's been a shortage of healthcare professionals for years compared to the number of people seeking care. I've heard many arguments about how "doctors are paid too much anyway." That argument completely ignores the fact that the money is a significant motivator for people who go into the medical field. If 20% fewer people decide to go into the medical field, our healthcare shortage gets even worse. And, like it or not, numbers matter. No matter how passionate the doctors out there are, if there aren't enough of them to keep up with the demand then we can't provide adequate healthcare.

Even among doctors who don't go to med school just for the money, med school is expensive. By the time they get through undergrad, go through med school, do residency, get certified (assuming they don't do a specialty, which takes even longer) unless they come from a family that could afford to pay for all of that, they'll be in loads of debt. Probably 30k or more a year in tuition & school costs, 20k or more a year in cost of living(and that's assuming they live in areas with such a low cost of living, NY, CA and other more expensive areas are even worse) all in debt. About 50k a year. For about 10-12 years, most likely. They'll be half a million or more in debt, most likely. Most people, when faced with that kind of debt in order to pursue a career, will choose a different career path if you start telling them they'll only make 40k, 50k, 80k a year, are gonna seriously rethink their career choices.... See More

Not all doctors make the big money, though. The big money is generally paid in big hospitals or boutique medical facilities. General practitioners, family practitioners, local doctors don't make nearly that much money. They also see fewer patients. Hospitals are flooded with patients and their doctors have a never-ending supply of patients demanding their time and attention. They work long, arduous hours, with few days off and in a high pressure environment always worried that if they make a single mistake, the patient will try and take them for everything they have. I knew a doctor who worked at a hospital. He had one day off a week. He worked 12 or more hours a day - many times, he'd work straight through for days in a row, living on coffee and hospital food. He didn't even bother renting an apartment. He showered at the hospital, slept on a couch or a cot in the break room and wore scrubs all the time. He made a very good salary but he worked his butt off and had no life.

If you want someone to be willing to take a job that demanding, which consumes that much of their life, you'd better be willing to compensate them.

No, this government healthcare program is not a good idea. It will not serve any public good. If everyone had insurance, they'd have better access since private doctors wouldn't refuse them as often. But they don't. And you can't force everyone to buy insurance. Nor can you force the people who are working and making money to pay for the people who don't. I've been one of the people who can't afford insurance because I didn't make enough money. I had to choose between having a place to sleep or having insurance. I chose to have a place to sleep. I chose to spend my income on my day to day necessities, counting on the fact that I was a healthy young adult, less likely to need expensive medical care. That was not the best scenario but it was a choice I made. If I had gotten hurt or ill, I'd have had to pay out of pocket. But just because I didn't buy insurance doesn't mean YOU should have to pay for me to get treatment. That was my choice and I accepted the consequences of it.

It's called freedom of choice. Freedom of choice is meaningless without the freedom to take the consequences of your choice. If the government is going to pay for everyone to be taken care of, the government will go bankrupt as long as we live in a system based on some form of money exchange. Unless we do away with money and just pay people through distribution of resources. Won't work, since money is the basis of the GLOBAL economy. Further, that gives the power to distribute resources to the government. Which also means that the government has the power to deny resources or take them away. It's the same principle with our rights. Our rights don't come from the government, the presumption is that we already have rights unless they are limited by legislative action. That's why our laws and system is a proscriptive, not a prescriptive, one. We don't tell people what they are allowed to do, we tell them what they are not allowed to do. And try to only do that when it is something which causes harm either to another individual or to the public as a whole.

Our government wasn't designed to provide for the public good. It was merely designed to prevent public harm.

This is your basic civics lesson for today.

NCYou did not touch on the topic of how preventative treatment provided would decrease expenses by avoiding (generally expensive) emergency treatment and surgery. Your first argument also seems to function on the premise that everyone who will be forced to get health insurance will be in need of expensive long term treatments and no healthy people ... See Morewill be added to the pool like say students who werent able to buy it because they needed a place to sleep. And I would think that (because treatment is expensive) it would be less costly for us to pay their monthly premiums than it would be to pay for their emergency surgery when they cant. I also would think that adding healthy people that were without care to a health insurers pool is probably more beneficial to them than it is hurtful to add people with pre existing conditions. Not to mention you might be able to curtail the abuse from the insurance companies of retroactively denying coverage for a heart attack to their members for undisclosed pre existing conditions of say knee pain.

Which brings us to the last point about the government providing protection which is spot on at the point of inception but we also have evolved to a point where without help we would never be able to advance or provide for ourselves and this bill is designed to protect us from the abuses of those who exploit our inability to care for ourselves and those people in this case happen to be the insurance corporations. Its just reality that we depend on other people to survive and that we depend on services to function and advance and in a modern society. And while we depend on things there is a power to control and a chance for manipulation and exploitation of that power. Personally in the specific case id rather have an organization I have a say in (our government) to have control over that power of whether I live or die or whether I get a transplant or not and not a for profit corporations who make more profit by providing as little care as possible.

Me:To NC: So, according to the last part of your argument, you'd prefer to be in Canada or Cuba, where the government pays for your healthcare and decides how long you'll have to wait for what you need?

As for the first - I never assumed or stated an assumption that there would be more people in need of treatment than healthy people. All I pointed out was ... See Morethat if you increase the outflow beyond the income, the end result is bankruptcy. And all of that was simply the basis of the bigger point - that healthcare is subject to the laws of supply and demand and how the system works, and how the interplay of forces work to create an unsustainable and ineffective system that leads to the only alternative of the government taking over health care in its entirety and the consequences of that.

ChrisNot to be terribly anecdotal, but as I recall the average time from arrival to treatment in Canada is actually -lower- than the US.

JessIn Japan we have unlimited government healthcare and you don't have to wait for anything. I could walk in there today and tell them I have a broken finger and I'd be treated EXTREMELY well. Even as a foreigner!

BenI should note that in Australia, at least (and I beleive it's similar in Canada) the government health care provides a basic set of services (quite comprehensive, though) that everyone should be entitled to. If you don't want to wait for months on end for elective surgery, by all means join a private health fund. If you can't afford it, and you're ... See Moreinjured in a car accident, you can rest assured that you won't be refused care by a hostpital because of your lack of private cover. The well-off get quick service, the rest of us get to take a sick day from work without losing a weeks wages in doctors fees. Win-win!

NCIf it came down to a choice between an insurance company deciding how long I wait or the government deciding how long I wait id choose the government. But thats not really what this is about this is about a market that determines the wait time and who controls that market. I would much rather have someone who has a stake in my opinion control the ... See Moremarket rather than someone who has a stake in my money.

And of course if expenses you exceed income you go bankrupt but what I believe you were saying is that all these people who the insurance companies are forced to take on with make their expenses exceed income which is not necessarily the case. It may in fact lower the cost of care overall and even possibly increase their profit thus a government option was excluded thats what they truly fear for their profits. Not to mention that insurance company profit margins are high now anyway so it does not seem for the moment they are in any danger of bankruptcy.

Without continuing the off topic, Roscoe, I'll respond directly to you. I accept that there is a president, and love him or hate him he has two more years. If the people you have been talking to have been as described, you've been talking to "crazies".

The tea party movement - and the vast vast majority of the republicans, libertarians, and democrats involved therein - can be summarized as follows:

Let us return to the government set up in the constitution.... See More

Add in a dash of "fiscal responsibility" and "anti-entitlement" sentiment, and you've described the tea party. Just as every liberal gathering has at least one 9-11 truther, every tea party will have one anarchist whacko. You'll always have the lunatic fringe, but a more wide reading of the group should cure that poor notion.

Me:To NC: One person with a serious medical concern, particular someone who needs ongoing treatment, costs more to treat than ten healthy persons will pay into the system. It doesn't require that the number of persons needing expensive treatment exceed the number of people paying into the system who don't.

As for responding with anything more specific, you're going to have to be more clear in your own responses. I honestly can't figure out what you're saying in most of your response.

To Ben: That's nice that Australia has done that. What's the Australian debt load like? How is Australia's government's tax structure set up? How do they handle the nation's economy and the nation's debt and/or surplus? My point is this: Australia has an entirely different system(by which I mean the entire structure of the government and, realistically, the entire nation). That system may be better able to handle certain things and worse in handling others. I don't believe it's an overall BETTER system, I'll tell you right off. Could the US system be restructured in such a way as to do the same thing? Possibly. Do the American citizens WANT it restructured in such a way? Check the polls. But, under the current US system, the only realistic endpoint is government takeover of the healthcare industry - which also means the ability to deny care (particularly if you're a political dissident). Even if we were to restructure the US, that's not the kind of thing you can make happen by ramming an unsustainable bill through congress against the great weight of the voting public's will (If you are going to try and say that since not everyone responded, that's not accurate, I have to point out that the people who care the most are the ones who respond. If you agree, you'll respond with agreement. If you disagree, you'll respond with disagreement. If you don't care enough one way or the other, well, you're not going to respond. So, among those who care, most of them are opposed.).... See More

Same thing for the issues with Japan.

The US system is based on multiple governments. We have a federal government, a government of "supreme but LIMITED powers" whose role is to defend our borders and facilitate regulation between the states. They've taken on some extra burden over the years but we've always tried to keep them limited where possible. The state governments are the ones who regulate their local economies, local codes, handle running the day to day affairs of their citizens in line with the wishes of their constituents. Or at least, they're supposed to. Compared to a system of one, centralized government, the US system has some advantages and disadvantages. Disadvantage: Decentralization of power means extra inefficiency and that the federal govt has to use indirect means to exert political pressure on the state governments, limited powers means that the federal government has to - in areas which are within the sphere of the local governments - defer to the states. Advantage: Decentralization of power and lack of supreme power being located in one seat of power makes dictatorship less likely and more difficult to achieve.

There are more advantages and disadvantages. I'm not going to go into detail. The point is that each system has advantages and disadvantages. Any system that consolidates power into the hands of a few individuals, though, is less desirable to me because I DO trust human nature. The spreading of power among multiple systems, which are comprised of a larger number of people necessarily, is more desirable even if it comes with more inefficiency. Comparing the US system's approach to healthcare to another government's approach is not apples to apples, it is not even apples to oranges, it is apples to onions. I.E. not even fruit to fruit, but fruit to vegetable. They may both be food but they are entirely different types.

And whether one system is better than another is another debate entirely. And one that will necessarily be subject to strong personal bias on all sides.

Also, Chris: I'd love to see your sources on that. My sources say the opposite. That being said, the point of my remark wasn't "Canada is so much worse!" it was to point out the discrepancy involved, i.e. "I get to go to the doctor, explain my problem, get checked up and have my problem dealt with or get a referral to someone who can better help me who I can see at my earliest opportunity" compared to "I get to go to the doctor and if it's not something that can be diagnosed and dealt with then and there, I get to wait until the government finds and approves of a specialist to see me regarding my problem." I actually suspect that the Canadian system may handle minor issues as well as or better than many hospitals and doctor's offices in the US. But I can't see them handling bigger, more specialized issues as well. In particular because specialists are kind of a limited resource. But I'll admit that's not based on personal experience or statistical information, it's based on my own understanding of the system, the laws of supply and demand and limited resources and access to those resources, as well as simple "where people are" considerations.

NCWell you said

"you'd prefer to be in Canada or Cuba, where the government pays for your healthcare and decides how long you'll have to wait for what you need?"

and I said... See More

"If it came down to a choice between an insurance company deciding how long I wait or the government deciding how long I wait id choose the government."

But I believe what you were inferring is that "the market" decides and that this bill amounts to a government takeover of that market which is and isnt really the case because the market consists of only a few major players who can decide to do what they want to this market which basically means it is a government controlled market only we dont have any control over that government.

and obviously a sick person will cost more than what a healthy person pays but eventually there is a ratio that will even the costs out and I dont think this bill will force that ratio to be uneven in a way that has more money going out. I believe that you underestimate the amount of unsick uninsured.

MeI never mentioned the market. I never addressed the forces driving the prices, only the requirement that income exceed expenses and the issue of scarcity of resources, with healthcare professionals, equipment and time as resources.

The bill has a lot of other problems anyway but sticking to the points raised without going to the possibility of not previously paying in and getting insurance AFTER you get sick and other major flaws...

The number of unsick uninsured who will be forced to pay? Or the number of unsick uninsured who will be government subsidized? Because if they're paying in out of pocket, they're supporting the system's ability to perform its function. If they weren't buying insurance before because they couldn't and they have to be subsidized, the whole damn point is moot and it leads to the problem I mentioned before - the government losing money on the deal until they feel forced to step in and forcibly arrange prices effectively(if not actually) taking over the healthcare market in its entirety. Which leads to the rest of the issues I mentioned - number of available healthcare professionals, compensation, motivation to go into healthcare, etc.... See More

The number of unsick uninsured were accounted for in my point, you see, as part of what costs the government in order to provide these services and will lead to the problem with prices - which is probably what led you to assume I was talking about the market. I didn't mention the pricing issue in the market context. I mention it in the resource context. If the government subsidizes these people, they're going to be spending a lot of money. If they don't, then you have to remember these people probably didn't buy insurance because they can't afford it without subsidies. The government will, when they realize how much money they're losing, attempt to control the price they're forced to pay through the subsidies. Which means attempting to control the price of healthcare since they can't reduce the probability of illness in a given person based on that person's physical fitness, age, race and genetic history so the price of the care that a person is likely to need is the simplest part of what determines the price of insurance to try and control. Which is going to in turn wind up, as they try to force the cost of healthcare itself down, result in either regulation of salaries or outright takeover of the healthcare system. And I think you know the rest of the point I was bringing up by now.

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

This is a basic civics lesson. Not fully explained, not completely elaborated. It is, obviously, on the subject of the new healthcare legislation.

I don't support forcing insurance companies to accept any and all comers and pay for all things. Insurance is based on the concept of paying in along the way to get the benefit when you need it. The companies, if required to pay out in excess of what is paid in, will go out of business. They refuse people with pre-existing medical conditions in most cases - except that some will accept them with significantly increased rates - because those people aren't taking it on a "if they need it in the future" basis. They're going to pay in less than the benefit they get and the insurance company will make no money on their policies. Follow that to its logical conclusion, when you force the companies to pay out continually more than they take in, and you find the companies going bankrupt. Those people lose their coverage unless the government takes over the entire thing, either paying out and covering all medical expenses (and going bankrupt as they pay the demanded rates) or taking over the providing of healthcare itself.

Completely aside from the inefficiency of government compared to private industry, that leads to a motivation problem. Like it or not, there are certain basic truths we have to accept. Healthcare is subject to the laws of supply and demand. There are only so many healthcare professionals to provide care to those seeking it. There's been a shortage of healthcare professionals for years compared to the number of people seeking care. I've heard many arguments about how "doctors are paid too much anyway." That argument completely ignores the fact that the money is a significant motivator for people who go into the medical field. If 20% fewer people decide to go into the medical field, our healthcare shortage gets even worse. And, like it or not, numbers matter. No matter how passionate the doctors out there are, if there aren't enough of them to keep up with the demand then we can't provide adequate healthcare.

Even among doctors who don't go to med school just for the money, med school is expensive. By the time they get through undergrad, go through med school, do residency, get certified (assuming they don't do a specialty, which takes even longer) unless they come from a family that could afford to pay for all of that, they'll be in loads of debt. Probably 30k or more a year in tuition & school costs, 20k or more a year in cost of living(and that's assuming they live in areas with such a low cost of living, NY, CA and other more expensive areas are even worse) all in debt. About 50k a year. For about 10-12 years, most likely. They'll be half a million or more in debt, most likely. Most people, when faced with that kind of debt in order to pursue a career, will choose a different career path if you start telling them they'll only make 40k, 50k, 80k a year, are gonna seriously rethink their career choices.

Not all doctors make the big money, though. The big money is generally paid in big hospitals or boutique medical facilities. General practitioners, family practitioners, local doctors don't make nearly that much money. They also see fewer patients. Hospitals are flooded with patients and their doctors have a never-ending supply of patients demanding their time and attention. They work long, arduous hours, with few days off and in a high pressure environment always worried that if they make a single mistake, the patient will try and take them for everything they have. I knew a doctor who worked at a hospital. He had one day off a week. He worked 12 or more hours a day - many times, he'd work straight through for days in a row, living on coffee and hospital food. He didn't even bother renting an apartment. He showered at the hospital, slept on a couch or a cot in the break room and wore scrubs all the time. He made a very good salary but he worked his butt off and had no life.

If you want someone to be willing to take a job that demanding, which consumes that much of their life, you'd better be willing to compensate them.

No, this government healthcare program is not a good idea. It will not serve any public good. If everyone had insurance, they'd have better access since private doctors wouldn't refuse them as often. But they don't. And you can't force everyone to buy insurance. Nor can you force the people who are working and making money to pay for the people who don't. I've been one of the people who can't afford insurance because I didn't make enough money. I had to choose between having a place to sleep or having insurance. I chose to have a place to sleep. I chose to spend my income on my day to day necessities, counting on the fact that I was a healthy young adult, less likely to need expensive medical care. That was not the best scenario but it was a choice I made. If I had gotten hurt or ill, I'd have had to pay out of pocket. But just because I didn't buy insurance doesn't mean YOU should have to pay for me to get treatment. That was my choice and I accepted the consequences of it.

It's called freedom of choice. Freedom of choice is meaningless without the freedom to take the consequences of your choice. If the government is going to pay for everyone to be taken care of, the government will go bankrupt as long as we live in a system based on some form of money exchange. Unless we do away with money and just pay people through distribution of resources. Won't work, since money is the basis of the GLOBAL economy. Further, that gives the power to distribute resources to the government. Which also means that the government has the power to deny resources or take them away. It's the same principle with our rights. Our rights don't come from the government, the presumption is that we already have rights unless they are limited by legislative action. That's why our laws and system is a proscriptive, not a prescriptive, one. We don't tell people what they are allowed to do, we tell them what they are not allowed to do. And try to only do that when it is something which causes harm either to another individual or to the public as a whole.

Our government wasn't designed to provide for the public good. It was merely designed to prevent public harm.

Monday, March 29, 2010

I decided to start a blog to blurt out my political opinions based on the debates and issues of the day. I try and keep up with politically important events in the US and abroad when I am able to fit it into my otherwise busy schedule and sometimes, especially with the idiocy going on lately, I want to get out some of my opinions.

I am not a democrat. Or a republican. I self-identify as a libertarian, though I strongly disagree with the libertarian party on many issues (particularly on taxes). I'm going to lay out a basic description of some of my political opinions, which I will go into more detail on in later posts.

Topic #1: Abortion.I don't like abortion. I make no bones about this. I'm not a big fan of it. I think the way some people treat abortion like it's just another birth control option is disgusting. It's morally reprehensible. That's not to say that I look down on people who get pregnant by accident - who took precautions (BC didn't work, the condom broke, the surgery botched) and were placed into a situation by circumstances. I just don't like people who are too lazy or stupid to use contraceptives figuring they can just get an abortion later. And I've seen that happen too often for anyone to try and dismiss it. With that out of the way, I am pro-choice. I may think the use of abortion as birth control - especially primary birth control - is morally reprehensible, I think it's more morally reprehensible to deny abortion to a victim of rape or incest, or force a woman to have the child when carrying the child will kill the mother or in other exigent circumstances. My ideal for abortion is "safe, legal and never."

Topic #2: Homosexuality/Bisexuality.I don't give a crap what you want to do in your own bedroom with another consenting adult. I really don't. I'm only interested in women. Respect that and I will respect your preference. That being said, on the issue of gay marriage... will someone PLEASE tell me what the actual damn problem is here? Is it the rights? Is it the name "marriage?" What if we literally strip the word marriage from any state, legislative or legal meaning and call everything that is govt recognized a civil union or domestic partnership and make marriage purely a communal/religious/personal status? I've seen this idea put forward before. Lots of religious people oppose it. Lots of people who are rooted in tradition oppose it. But the people who've opposed it most? Are the ones pushing for gay marriage. Marriage, to the best of my knowledge, is not a constitutionally guaranteed and protected right. And even if it is, our rights are NOT unlimited - almost all of our rights are subject to governmental limitations, whether in the form of taxation, prohibitions against certain behaviors, prescribing proper arenas for certain behavior, etc. You have the right to file a lawsuit, for example, but only following proper governmental procedures. Every time gay marriage has come up for a popular vote, it has been voted down. This topic is too aggravating to go into more detail now.

Topic #3: "Race"Ooh, big, scary topic. Not. I don't give a damn if you are black, white, green, purple or yellow. It makes not one bit of difference to me. What does make a difference to me is what kind of person you are. How you conduct yourself. How you act. I will treat you with respect if you treat others with respect. If you act like an idiot, I will treat you like an idiot. No one is entitled to anything just because of who they are. No matter what happened a hundred years ago. If real discrimination is encountered, it needs to be dealt with - no matter whether it is against a particular race, religion, gender, nationality, etc (even if it's against a group you think "can't" be discriminated against) - but crying racism all the time over everything detracts from the impact of the claim when it's warranted. Especially when the claim is used as a smokescreen to try and obscure a real issue.

Ok, these are a few basic topics. I've got more opinions - on healthcare, insurance, tort law, the constitution, religion, crime and punishment - which I'll get into later. And I'll get into these topics above too. But not right now. Right now, I have a warm bed calling my name.